


Prior Claim

by tempus_teapot (dreadnot)



Series: In the Strangest Places [10]
Category: Dragon Age
Genre: M/M, in the strangest places
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-09
Updated: 2011-10-09
Packaged: 2017-10-24 11:17:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,124
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/262861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dreadnot/pseuds/tempus_teapot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zevran's response to hearing that his warden slept with Morrigan for the dark ritual.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Prior Claim

After crisscrossing Ferelden to assemble armies, slay dragons, and generally interfere in the lives of humans, elves, dwarves, werewolves, mages, templars, cultists, and faithful Andrastians, Widald Amell thought that he had plumbed the depths of weariness.

He was wrong.

With the archdemon dead and Denerim in flames, Dal was swept under by a wave of fatigue. He vaguely remembered Shale carrying him to find their other companions. He might have dreamed the warmth of Wynne’s healing magic and his mumbled responses to the others’ questions about the archdemon and Riordan’s fate. He couldn’t say where his friends had found him four undamaged walls, a roof, and a bed. He couldn’t say when they put him to bed or how long he slept once he was there.

When he drifted out of the depths of the Fade and into consciousness, the only thing that was familiar and comforting was the warm body nestled at his back. He reached back to touch Zevran’s hip, confirming that it was his lover against him in the dark.

Whether Zevran had only been lying in silence in the dark or whether Dal’s movement had woken him, he reacted with an understanding of Dal’s priorities that no one else could hope to approach.

“Your staff is here.” Zevran took his hand to guide it, showing him by touch where his staff was propped against the bed. “My sword is on my side, my dagger close at hand.”

He felt lips warm on his shoulder – bare shoulder, when had he undressed?

Zev chuckled with his lips still against his skin. “Now that you know where the weapons are, you may relax, my love. Everyone wants to see the Hero, but none will violate your well-earned rest.”

Another chuckle, soft lips and vibration sending a jolt down Dal’s spine. “Unless you want some violation.”

A bit of celebratory ravishing sounded wonderful in theory, but in practice? Dal groaned as he rolled over to face Zevran, calling a tiny spell wisp to hover near the ceiling, summoning shadows out of the dark with its faint glow.

“How long?” His throat was still raw from shouting and smoke, his voice rough and thick with sleep.

“For you I can go all day,” Zevran said before his teeth flashed with his grin and he gave a more serious answer, “You have slept half a day. If I am right, and I always am about such things, we still have hours until dawn.”

Which explained Dal’s sudden acute awareness of thirst, hunger, and the need to empty his bladder. He put those concerns aside for more immediate questions.

“The others?”

“The king,” Zevran conferred the title with a twist of amusement, “was as exhausted as you. Our dear Wynne suspects that it may be related to Grey Wardens’ connections to the darkspawn and the archdemon. Leliana is watching over him as I have watched over you. Albeit, I suspect with less bare skin. More the pity for him.”

Dal laughed softly and pushed himself upright. "That's Wynne, Leliana, and Alistair accounted for."

Maker but he was tired, but he found the energy to swing the wisp down to floor level when he leaned over the bed to look beneath in the hopes of finding a chamber pot. He grunted with the effort and asked, "Oghren, Sten, and Shale?"

"All alive," Zevran assured him. "And your hound would be in bed with us if I had not stated a prior claim. I suspect he is the reason there is no light leaking under the door.”

Chamber pot located, Dal swung his feet over the edge of the bed and said nothing more while he took care of one of the three demands his body had for him. Food and drink could wait, he realized that he hadn’t had the opportunity to take care of this particular necessity in far longer than half a day. Somehow fighting waves of darkspawn didn’t lend itself to stopping for a piss.

See, he told himself, sometimes life could boil down to simple things – an empty bladder, maybe a glass of water, perhaps something to eat. He and Zev could—

“You have not asked about Morrigan.”

Right. And that was the end of simple things.

The best he could say about that moment was that Zevran had waited until he was putting the chamber pot away.

“She’s gone,” Dal said. He didn’t ask, it was a simple statement.

“So it would seem.” Zevran ran a fingertip down Dal’s spine, forcing him out of his slump with the shiver his touch provoked. “I do not wish to seem to be a jealous lover…”

“Why not?” Dal twisted to see Zev’s face in the dim light. “Why not be jealous? I told you I love you. I promised you that we have a future, and the last night we might spend together before marching off to almost certain death, I spend with Morrigan.”

Finally Zevran’s smile slipped. “I do not wish it, but I _am_ jealous. You have made me feel many things I have tried to put behind me.” He leaned closer to Dal, his voice dropping to an angry growl. “And I do not like it. So now that the archdemon is slain and we both still live, I will know why – why her? Why then?”

That was fair. Maker knew it was fair. He even had a good reason for what he had done, but even with good reasons, he could barely meet Zev’s angry eyes. Oh yes, he was the hero who had stopped the Blight, but he couldn’t tell his lover that he’d fucked a witch to save his own life.

There was also the matter of the child.

“No secrets.” Not even Wardens’ secrets. Dal told him everything, the death warrant that killing the archdemon was to a warden, Riordan’s expectation that he would be the one to die, Morrigan’s offer, and the child.

He didn’t let himself look away from Zevran’s face, but after the first few sentences, he couldn’t read enough from his expression to know how Zev was taking the news.

He _thought_ Zev was practical enough to take this ultimately in stride, but love was a strange, impractical thing. Jealousy was no better.

When he finished, he was exhausted again, but at least it had been brought out. All that was left was for Zevran to say something. Anything.

What was going on behind those beautiful eyes?

“How could you…?”

Dal’s stomach lurched.

Zevran shook his head at him, his expression tight enough to recall their confrontation with Taliesin.

For one long, heart-stopping second, Dal was certain that everything was over.

Then the tightness broke into a teasing grin. “How could you not invite me to watch? My one chance to see an ancient sex ritual—”

“Or to see me have sex with a woman.”

Zevran practically sang, “Isabela…”

“Doesn’t count,” Dal countered, but now that his heart was no longer going to be broken, he found he still had a smile somewhere in his emotional reserves.

“My one chance to see Morrigan in all her delectable, luscious, curvaceous—”

“Zevran,” Dal said warningly.

“Oh no,” Zevran said, shifting up onto all fours to crawl across the bed toward Dal, magnificently, perfectly nude. “You came back to me with her kisses upon your lips, I will imagine her naked glory to my heart’s content and if you speak, it will be only to give me details. Were her thighs smooth?”

The spell wisp rose like a tiny moon to limn Zevran in silver and gold. No accident that, and they both knew it. It added an extra roll and sway to Zev’s movements as he brought his lips a breath away from Dal’s.

“What did she taste like?”

“Zev—”

Zevran silenced him with a kiss. “You did not listen to me, my love. The only words I want from you are answers to my questions. Were her thighs smooth?”

Dal nodded dumbly.

“Tell me.”

The wisp drifted closer, showing Zevran’s cock hanging soft between his thighs. He would never be able to explain why, but he felt better seeing that Zev wasn’t hard yet.

“They were soft. As smooth as yours, but not as muscled.”

Zev drew the tip of his nose along Dal’s jaw. “Her taste. Tell me.”

“Herbs.” He reached for Zev, but Zev shook his head and pinned his hands to the bed. “Herbs and something underneath, like fennel. Her skin tasted like salt and magic.”

“Her nipples?” Zev asked, his breath making Dal’s skin break with goose flesh.

“Dark.” Dal kept his eyes open rather than close them to see Morrigan more vividly in his mind’s eye. She was beautiful, but what Dal saw in this room was more beautiful still. “The size of an Orlesian silver.”

“Did you kiss them?”

“Yes.”

“Tell me.”

“She was above me on the bed and when she leaned down, I rose up to kiss her breast. She moved her nipple to my mouth and I sucked.”

Now Dal could see Zev slowly growing harder. Was this his punishment? To see his lover aroused by the thought of his infidelity?

“Teeth?”

“Not at first.” Dal tried to pull his hands away and Zev let him before putting a finger in the center of his chest to push.

“Lie down.”

Having finally caught on to some of the rules of the game, Dal slid fully onto the bed and lay on his back, not surprised in the least when Zevran moved to straddle him. This time he didn’t pull against Zev’s hold on his hands when he pushed them into the mattress.

“She liked teeth, didn’t she?”

Dal held Zev’s eyes and nodded. “She bit. And scratched.”

“Why no marks, then my love, did you heal yourself before coming back to me?”

Dal nodded again. He had not wanted to flaunt what would already be too obvious.

Zevran bit his earlobe until he hissed a breath through his teeth. “When I leave marks, you will not heal them and when you are recovered, there _will_ be marks, my dearest heart.”

He kissed where he had bitten. “Tell me yes.”

The word sounded half-strangled, but Dal got it out. “Yes.”

“Tell me more. She was on top of you? The whole time?”

“Yes. It was… easier that way.”

Zevran fairly purred his next question. “How did she get you ready for her?”

Not how he got her ready for him. Zev knew him well enough to know which of the two people in that bed had needed help.

“With her mouth.”

Zevran pulled back to see Dal’s face. “Good girl. Was she good? Did you think of her or of me? Or someone else?”

“I didn’t think of anyone.” Dal tried to catch Zev’s lips for a kiss, but Zev pulled away with a faint _tsk._

“Was she good? What did you think about?”

“A little too toothy.” Dal let his head fall back on the pillow and gave up the fight. “All I thought about was the feeling. I tried not to think about who was sucking me and I tried so hard not to think of you because I wanted to be with you, not with her.”

“And then?”

A glance showed that Zev was still not fully hard, but neither was he completely soft. Dal knew that a good stiff breeze could have Zev tenting that leather skirt of his.

Maker how he loved that leather skirt. Sometimes when Zev performed a particularly acrobatic leap, Dal could see—

“And then?” Zev repeated.

“And then she… I…” Dal tried to find a way to phrase it, but what were the right words? “She moved on top of me again and we….”

Zev watched his verbal flailing for a moment before having mercy on him. He kissed Dal with surprising tenderness before releasing his hands.

“My jealousy has been laid to rest.” He touched Dal’s cheek before rolling away to nestle against Dal’s side again. “That was not cheating. That was barely even sex.”

Wait. What?

Dal shifted over to his side. “That’s it? I thought you were going to…” He gestured vaguely at Zevran’s groin.

Zev chuckled and draped his arm across Dal’s chest, gleaming gold against Dal’s much darker skin. “You are not the only one who fought an archdemon. Now that I know that you will be well, I will take my own rest.”

He tweaked Dal’s nipple and yawned. “And then I am going to take you until the only word you remember is my name.” He yawned again and mumbled. “And yes. You have my permission to remember yes.”

Dal smiled and let the spell wisp wink out. “Yes, Zevran.”

_Yes._


End file.
